New Columne by Sakaguchi :x
The google translator spit me something out about Games and Rice :x
Well if anyone is so kind to translate it , please do :P
Since the Mistwalker translation will take ages...

I feel “being paid to do what I enjoy” is very important to life’s energy. I’m fortunate that through a set of coincidences, I was able to land a career in the creation of video games. I truly appreciate the pioneers who led me, the people who supported me, and most of all, the people who play the games.

Making games is my “favorite thing,” so it’s fun and I’m naturally able to concentrate.
But I want you to think about it for a second.
The reality is that “being paid to do what I enjoy” is difficult. In order to make things work, you need to become a professional and change your mentality from having fun to “making fun for people.” You must be more creative than necessary, but it’s in order to make your favorites fun for people. This is an important factor in games, being a form of entertainment.

But some people say I look like I’m “totally enjoying myself” and don’t have any troubles. It’s little frustrating, as I do fall on hard times and have my share of suffering (^^ゞ But if I “show I’m having hardship,” it might translate into what I make. Even if “I’m suffering” deep inside, the right approach may be to look like “I’m not suffering at all.”
So even today, I will purposely hide my troubles in secret…
Though I don’t have the answer, I’m worried my troubles will heavily affect production.
There is a light at the end of the tunnel.

Nobuo Uematsu and Takuya Matsumoto
who shared the joys and sorrows throughout the project.
Despite it looking like we are having fun,
the subject of the conversation was serious.

Yutaka Noma, who also shared joys and sorrows together.
It’s been a while, so we met up again and had drinks.

I don't know. I never played BD+. For all my love for Mistwalker, I still can't bring myself to ever buy a Brownie Brown game. Especially not a RTS.

Same :lol :lol

His updates have been pretty blah lately. He's messing with legos again.

Originally Posted by Sakaguchi

Speaking of which, I'm meeting with Kitase who is a director (producer?) of FF for drinks. He's an enthusiastic Star Wars fan way beyond me. We are meeting since the release date of FF13 was decided, and also making a toast in celebration of finishing the milestone, while talking about funny storied related to it. Maybe I will buy one of Star Wars lego sets as a gift for him at the NEW Lego shop, (^ ^ゞ.

I went out for drinks with colleagues from our Square days. They all are independently successful and live their lives to the extreme, such as being a composer, graphic artist, director, etc. It's been a long time, but in their faces I saw a look of brilliance and vitality. It was such a wonderful feeling. Their vigor put me in a really good mood today.

One of them is continously making iPhone applications. Another is flying out to Australia for work first thing in the morning. A couple of them are currently working with me but having a little problem with the schedule. We talked about all kinds of stuff. Of course, we talked about the old days, too.

It really was a fun night, feeling their positive aura, wanting to work with them again..
See ya.

"A thousand lightning bolts in the sky, my lord!
Is this finally the day?"

"NO!" he said as he stood up from his throne.
"The prophecy is a lie!"
"I won't allow such nonsense!"
"Bring me Nomura san!"

A knight on a white horse stood in front of the gates of Squaresoft.
"I've come to claim what is rightfully mine!"
"We have come to claim what is rightfully ours!"

A hundred knights, some of which he had fired the day before, how was this possible!
"NO!" he said again, "I, Yoichi Wada will not resign!".
"I still hold the key to Matsuno's power, you can do nothing but run like you did all those years ago!"

"But I have returned with the blessing of the sun, thunder and Nippon!"
"The day is ours, your reign is weak!", Sakaguchi was determined to fight.
"NONSENSE" he shouted once more.

A black knight emerged from the shadows.
The zippers the belts it was none other than...
"Nomura San defeat these fools once and for all!", Wada had no intention to give up his kingdom...
"Yes my master!", Nomura stood in front of a crowd of thousands, just one lone warrior left to defend the traitors.

"Your awkward and cringeworthy CG love stories won't save Squaresoft and won't save Nippon!"
"Takeuchi has given the signal, a new lord will arise and I.... I will save Nippon!"

"NEVER!", Wada shouted again, "The Council of Honorable Shareholders hath spoken, I remain the Grandmaster!"
"They are corrupted by the pupils of Yamauchi!", one shouted but Wada did not listen.
"I can defeat all of you!" Nomura said!

The earth shook, time froze, the savior had he arrived too soon? Was Nomura too strong for the ever weakening forces who walked the mist?

"NAY!" a bolt of lightning aimed at Sakaguchi reflected from ones sunglasses.
"Mikami san?... how?", Takeuchi who had rushed to the scene couldn't believe what he saw.
"Return to your exile, or face the punishment of a thousand ports!"
Just when Takeuchi wanted to deliver the final blow to his rival a ray of sun light reached his eyes!. "Nooooo... I can't see!". Ever wearing sunglasses Mikami stood proud and victorious.
"We have won!, We have won!" Suda said with delight.

"NEVER", Wada and his Black Knight still remained, not the combined forces of Nippon could stop their ever lasting reign. Untill...

"You have nothing left, Squaresoft is mine again!", Sakaguchi closed in on his mortal enemy.
Wada jumped up from his throne. mumbling, shouting, raging. He was sidestepped, this crisis was too much. A dragon emerged from the depths of the sea and saved Wada. "He who follows us awaits death!" a lone rider on the creature said.
"Thou had forsaken Krazy Ken, Thou will forever be under our control!"

The dragon flew to black castle in Kyoto. Everyone knew that they had indeed awoken the sleeping giant and that they would be under its evil control for a long time to come. The forces of the west were also growing stronger and Nippon could not compete. Today however, was a day of celebration, Squaresoft had been freed from the traitors, never to be corrupted again and Sakaguchi locked Nomura away in the dungeons of iPhone development.

Am I an "idle man", I wonder? (^^;
Well, I am just trying to pastime…
I am working hard on a new project.
Now we are being rushed into the “finishing” stage.
No matter what, I will make it really good....

Is it possible he's gone completely insane, and this project is a figment of his imagination?

Most of the photos with other people would have you believe he's holding it together, but I'm starting to doubt.

He's been insane for a while now. Everyone in the picture is really just him. He thought he was with a bunch of industry people and friends, but he's really alone in all those pictures and he's just imagining them.

Isn't it possible that he means an initial version or a prototype of the game?

edit: wow beaten by a mile.

I don't think you can really be rushed into a prototype though, can you?

I mean, prototypes can exist at all sorts of functionality levels, so I'd assume he means he at least needs to get the game into an alpha state that meets the actual definition of alpha (as in feature complete).

Does that mean it could be on consoles other than 360? Is that deal with Microsoft over? What exactly was the deal anyway? Was it for a certain amount of games?

It was most likely a "Right of first refusal" contract, meaning that Microsoft had to be offered the first chance to publish their games, but if Microsoft refused to, then any other publisher could publish the games instead.

It was most likely a "Right of first refusal" contract, meaning that Microsoft had to be offered the first chance to publish their games, but if Microsoft refused to, then any other publisher could publish the games instead.

Hmmm, so we don't know for sure if that applies to a certain number of games or all games. If it's the latter, they might as well be a versatile second party.

As for why you can't have them on a console, it's because Microsoft recently had almost all of their top executives changed and the new team decided to take a new strategy of making profitable core games (Halo, Crackdown, etc) and also make a large expansion into the casual sector (with Natal).

Lost Odyssey and Blue Dragon cost a lot of money, but in the end they didn't make a lot. Microsoft achieved their goal of getting Japanese developers to make games for the Xbox 360, which was actually one of the main reasons they were trying to get a hardware presence in the region, but since console gaming is mostly dying in Japan and they have achieved their original goal, they decided to cut their losses and bail out of making big budget retail games targeted at the Japanese market.

It's unfortunate, but it also seems to be the reality of the situation.

The series sells well enough in the US, which is the only reason it's still being made at all. Atlus USA handles the bulk of any decision regarding the series now. Atlus Japan doesn't really give a crap.